Survey of Current Business (March-June 2023)

Sergey P. Aukutsionek – Head of Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences, Candidate of Economic Sciences (Moscow, Russia). E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Andrey S. Yegorov – Senior Researcher of the Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences, Candidate of Economic Sciences (Moscow, Russia). E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Inessa A. Bachirova – Researcher of the Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow, Russia). E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Tatyana V. Serzhantova – Researcher of the Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow, Russia). E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

In March 2023, the level of capacity utilization repeated the record of the previous month and for the third time in the entire history of REB’s observations (the first was recorded in October 2022) amounted to a maximum of 89% (from the normal monthly level taken as 100). The level of utilization of the available labor force came close to the maximum value for 31 years of observations, amounting to 97%. The diffusion index of the order-book level grew by 7 percentage points over the month and reached 64% – the highest value reached in the REB surveys since 1991. The diffusion index of three–month expectations of debt to banks, on the contrary, significantly decreased (by 12 points) and reached a historic low of 15%. The share of enterprises in «good» or «normal» financial condition amounted to 89% (in 30 years of observations it was higher only twice).

Key words: Russia, industry, industrial enterprises, price level, wages, employment, output, investment, indebtedness to banks, order-book level, stocks of finished products, capacity utilization rate, financial situation, production restrictive factors.

JEL-codes: D22, D24, G31, L23, P23.